IC inbox (pumpkin hollow)

[lovethyneighb_or]

Mulcahy here! Leave a message.

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june

[lovethyneighb_or]

The day on the delivery of the letters, Mulcahy is called upon to join an investigation.

A notice is posted to the door of his home.

Hello!

I've gone to investigate something strange and concerning that has come to my attention. I am in the good company of John Jay and Gaeta. Please wish us luck. If I do not return after morning in two days, I apologize. Please check on the key-ring spirit who lives in my home.

Be well,
Father Mulcahy

Earlier in June because I have INCREDIBLE timing

[pineapplesalmon]

[This has been obviously rehearsed and yet it still falls apart.]

Hello, I'm César Salazar. Reverend Degas said you're a Catholic priest. I'm, ah, purposefully lapsed, along with my parents, who are... dead now. They died saving the world. My baby brother wasn't old enough to make the decision along with us.

...

[He stops himself from rambling. And just waits, holding his breath.]

july

[not_a_traitor]

As usual, Gaeta can't sleep for more than a couple hours, so he's out and about in the early morning, hoping to turn the insomnia into a little motivation. The walk will do him some good as he keeps strengthening his bad leg, he figures; he'll find some breakfast, pick up a few groceries, maybe take an extra shift at the library once it's open to make up for all the time he missed in June...

...pass close enough to Father Mulcahy's house to notice -- is that a tent in the backyard?

And is someone inside it?

Puzzled, he slows to a halt, eyeing the setup with a frown.

Late September, prior to the ball

[notinflictthem]

It's been a while. They weathered the Blight together with unerring professionalism, and that was fine. Almost back to life prior to waking up here really, there were plenty of people wherein both Hawk and them were just cogs in one large weapons repair factory. Bodies came in, shrapnel and bodies were wheeled out. An efficient process.

But it's the little things you miss. Like Mulcahy praying during poker, or his inerring positivity during bad meals. If either are even applicable really- most days it feels like he barely knows the guy. Just some... image he had in his head of this sweet wilful priest prior to all of it. At least with his childhood friends he got to see them grow up into the men they became, with Mulcahy it's like this... blank space where someone was meant to put in footage. He may as well be a stranger, for all he's heard about what's meant to go in that space.

Well. If that's the case, then it's time to meet the neighbours. Make him less of a stranger.

Stuck to Mulcahy's apartment door is a note on the usual form that Hawk uses for prescriptions. In the little box, in writing more legible than his doctor scribbles, it says-

We need to have that talk you offered

-Hawk

several days post-gala

[incomingchoppers]

Radar's headache has finally eased up enough that he can think beyond immediate needs like get Leeds Manor tidied up and make sure Dahlia's okay. Still exhausted, but at least able to stay upright without someone gently trying to steer him to bed every few hours, he ventures into Downtown Hollow for a couple errands. Groceries, mostly. Maybe a small treat to cheer Dahlia up if he finds anything nice.

And -- as he realizes, with a guilty start, what he's neglected this whole time he was camped out at the estate -- checking on his friends.

So it's mid-morning when Mulcahy gets a knock on his door, followed by a muffled, "Father? You there? It's Radar."

Early December, before Eddie's disappearance

[pineapplesalmon]

[ When César calls Mulcahy up, he's wheezing with laughter still. ]

Father, Rex showed up. He just saw my shrine and asked me if we're Catholic.

givingstide

[not_a_traitor]

Among Mulcahy's Givingstide gifts is a tidily-wrapped box. Inside: the nicest collection of tea Gaeta could assemble from Blackwood Brews, along with a small teapot and matching cups.

An equally tidy note tucked inside the box reads:

Mulcahy,

This feels entirely too inadequate for what you've given me these past nine months. I've become very used to bearing up alone, or for any extended kindness to be punctuated by loss at best, devastation at worst. That you've kept some of my worst memories and nightmares at bay -- literally and figuratively -- has given me hope that I might do more than just survive, eventually. I haven't had hope like that in a while.

Maybe next year, we'll both be able to drink this in the daylight, and not at three in the morning after our respective rough nights.

Happy Givingstide.

All the best,
Felix Gaeta